One Does Not Simply Divide By Zero
by ahiijny
Summary: Osaka tries to divide by zero. Then, bad things start happening.


**あずまんが大王****- Azumanga Daioh: created by Azuma Kiyohiko**

* * *

"…_only works when x isn't equal to 0. Because you can't divide by zero."_

Osaka sits in the classroom with a mechanical pencil in her hand. It's a work period. Yukari-sensei is snoozing at her desk, and there's some chatter throughout the classroom.

Osaka is doing math right now. She writes "85 / x" onto her blank piece of paper.

The chatter continues, unabated.

Then, Osaka writes "; x = 0".

In the distance, almost too quiet to be heard, there's an ominous sound. It lasts for less than a second. Nevertheless, all of the students in the class notice somehow and stop what they're doing. It's completely silent all of a sudden. They look around nervously.

Osaka looks up, confused. The class would never quiet down this quickly. Something is strange.

A pin falls onto the ground. It's perfectly audible to everyone in the classroom. The pin leaves an ominous ringing sound, taking an abnormally long time to fade away.

Tomo stands up and spots Osaka's paper. Tomo's eyes narrow in suspicion. She walks over to the desk and grabs the paper off the desk.

"Oh no. You didn't." Tomo's eyes widen in shock and fear.

"Wha?" Osaka is confused. "What did I do?"

Hands shaking, Tomo reaches down and picks up the paper. "Guys, we're all doomed."

"No way," Yomi shoots out of her seat in disbelief.

Chiyo turns around in her seat. Her eyes are starting to water up.

"What…?" Osaka begins to feel a sinking sensation in her stomach. "What happened?"

Tomo turns around and holds up the paper for the class to see.

There's a long pause.

"Shit," Yomi says.

Some students are starting to curl up in their seats now. Some are shivering in fear.

Yukari-sensei somehow senses the atmosphere and wakes up, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. "What happened?" she asks drowsily. From the silence, she knows that something has occurred.

"Osaka here divided by zero," Tomo says with utmost seriousness.

Yukari-sensei jolts wide awake. Her eyes narrow in slits. "You idiot…"

"Huh?" Osaka frantically looks around in confusion. "What do you mean? How's that bad? I just wrote something on a paper…"

"Yeah, she just wrote it on paper!" Chiyo jumps up to defend her friend. "It could have been worse. She—"

"No matter where she did it," Yukari-sensei says, eyes glowing red. "It's still enough. She's doomed us all."

"…" Osaka is getting frightened. How could writing something on a piece of paper doom anyone at all? Are they joking? But everyone in the class looks very dreadful right now. It doesn't seem very likely for _everyone_ in the class to participate in a joke like this…

The ringing from the pin finally fades away to below audibility.

"You divide by zero?" Yukari-sensei says, crossing her arms. "You get zero. You forfeit your math mark."

"Ehh…" Osaka sighs.

"In any case!" Sakaki takes a stand. She sounds very urgent. "It's too dangerous to stay here any longer! We need to proceed to evacuate!"

"She's right." Kagura stands up. "Let's go! Hurry!"

Yomi nods grimly.

The students of the classroom stand up and begin rushing towards the door.

"_Why not?"_

Yukari-sensei gives Osaka one last glare before heading towards the classroom door as well.

Osaka just sits there with a shocked expression on her face. Tomo left the paper on Osaka's desk in her haste to evacuate.

Chiyo turns to Osaka and places a hand on her wrist. "Come on, Osaka-san. We need to leave."

Osaka nods numbly, staring off into space.

Chiyo tugs on Osaka's sleeve until the older girl stands up and begins shuffling towards the door after her. Most of the other students have already left. They're the last two to leave the room.

"_Because you just can't, that's why. I said so. Yukari's word is law.""_

News is starting to spread about Osaka's actions through the panicked chatter of Yukari-sensei's students. People from other classrooms are poking their heads out of classrooms.

"Wait, really? No way."

"What should we do? Should we run?"

"We… we gotta get out of here!"

"Hurry! We don't know how much time we have left!"

"Somebody hit the fire alarm!"

Chiyo, still pulling Osaka through the hallways, claps her free hand over her ear just as the very loud alarm starts ringing.

Crowds of students are flooding the hallways, rushing towards the exits.

"It's a good thing we have outward-opening doors," Chiyo mutters, looking at the chaos ahead.

"Huh?" Osaka is already out of breath.

"The fire doors," Chiyo says louder. "If people are crushed against the doors by the trampling students, then the door will just be pushed open. No asphyxiation or anything."

"I've heard that… word before," Osaka pants. "Somethin'…"

Then, something explodes behind them.

Osaka and Chiyo are the only two students still remaining in this hallway. Chiyo stops to turn around and stare at the scene behind in shock. Osaka is a little slower in stopping, so she's now a few paces ahead of Chiyo.

Behind them, there's a swirl of plaster, brick, and papers being engulfed by a blinding light. The center of this vortex, the blinding light, is centered at where Osaka's desk used to be.

There's a continuous roaring or whirring sound. It's loud.

"Don't look directly at it!" Chiyo shouts over the sound of the vortex. "Osaka-san! It's like that magnesium experiment… Use your peripheral vision."

Osaka nods, staring paralyzed at the whirl of materials.

The whirl is slowly growing. It's gradually covering more and more area. It's approaching them.

"_You're not even our math teacher, Yukari-sensei. Why did you start talking about exponent laws all of a sudden?"_

Chiyo gasps, feeling a force beginning to tug at her. She reacts immediately. Using as much force as she can muster, she lunges forward and shoves Osaka away from the vortex.

Adrenaline can be useful in these situations.

Osaka slams into the stairwell door just as Chiyo falls the other way into a wall outcrop at the side of the hallway.

Osaka struggles to her feet, turning around. "Ah!... Chiyo-chan!"

The wall outcrop behind Chiyo is cracking. It's as if gravity had rotated by 90 degrees for her. She's lying against the wall.

"I… I can't move, Osaka-san," Chiyo yells. "Uh... But in any case, you need to leave now before the sphere of influence gets to you as well!"

"Huh?... But?..." Osaka has no idea what to do in this situation.

"There's no point if we both die!" Chiyo yells.

"Ah!... You said the D word," Osaka says. She looks distressed.

"It's probably what's going to happen," Chiyo shouts. "When we get sucked in."

"But… Chiyo-chan!" Osaka looks back and forth. There's no one else on this floor.

"I literally can't move!" Chiyo makes a visible effort to step forward, but she still can't move.

"Wait… literally or figuratively?" Osaka frowns.

"Literally literally!" Chiyo's shouts. "Listen! If not for this wall, I would already be sucked into that… blinding… vortex thing!"

"I'm sorry, Chiyo-chan!" Osaka looks horrified. "I didn't know …"

"No one blames you," Chiyo says.

"Well, they blame me."

Sheets of paper are flying down the hallway directly into the whirling vortex.

"Well okay sure, but I don't blame you," says Chiyo. "For the record."

"_Meh. I'm bored. Why not?"_

"I'm still sorry though," says Osaka.

"Well, okay then."

"Okay, then."

"Okay."

"Okay."

They stare at each other for a while as the roaring continues and the whirling vortex continues to grow.

"Okay…" they say at the same time.

"Well, hurry, then!" Chiyo shouts. "It's getting closer."

"Um…" Osaka begins pushing open the stairwell door. "What am I supposed to say in this situation? Am I supposed to ask you for your last words, or…"

Chiyo closes her eyes, smiling. "Just go already!"

"Ah, okay…" Osaka keeps hesitating.

"Bye-ni!" says Chiyo.

"…" Osaka nods, closes the door, and then rushes down the steps as quickly as she can.

She rushes out the school without changing into her outside shoes. There's a scattered crowd of people standing a fair distance away from the school, staring in awe at the vortex.

Osaka pauses for a moment, taking a look at the vortex, too. Then, she turns around and continues running further away from the school.

"Osaka!" Tomo runs up to her with an angry expression on her face. "Where's Chiyo-chan?"

Osaka had been dreading this question. "Um…"

Sakaki shoots Osaka a menacing glare.

Osaka gulps.

"_You said so yourself. You suck at math."_

Then, there are gasps. Osaka turns around and sees the vortex start growing faster and faster, accelerating, quickly consuming the entire school.

Osaka feels sick inside.

Some people start running away again. Some are getting into their cars and driving away. The rest just stare at the vortex like deer in headlights.

"When did it get so dark?" someone asks.

Osaka looks up at the sky. A few minutes ago, it had been cloudless, bright blue, and sunny. Now, the entire sky is obscured by angry black clouds.

_CRACK._

A violent lightning bolt shoots down, striking the branches of a nearby tree. A large portion of the tree falls off aflame.

Flammability or combustibility?

More lighting strikes.

_CRACK. CRACK._

Osaka looks around warily. There's way too many lightning bolts for this to be normal at all. There's tens of bolts flashing at any given moment.

"Tomo-chan… Sakaki-chan…" Osaka turns to them, about to say something.

Then, another bolt flashes through the air and strikes Sakaki, the tallest among them. Smoking, she falls over.

Osaka's eyes widen. They widen some more.

"This had better be a dream…" Osaka mutters.

"O. SA. KA." Tomo glares at her just as a nearby tornado tears a tree apart and the wooden splinters spray into the air.

Osaka watches numbly as Tomo falls over, penetrated by numerous wooden splinters.

"_Psh. Trivialities."_

"Okay, I've decided," Osaka says aloud. "If this isn't a dream, I've got some serious complaints to make."

Suddenly, the ground shakes violently. The earthquake throws Osaka off her feet.

Struggling into an upright position, Osaka sees the ground beneath the school crack open into an enormous crevice. It's hundreds of meters long, and tens of meters wide. What remains of the school falls into the darkness below. That doesn't stop the blinding anomaly thing, though. It falls with the school, continuing to suck up chunks of rock and dirt.

She looks up. In the air, she can see the black clouds swirling and then suddenly dispersing very quickly.

In the distance, beyond all of the lightning bolts, a meteorite the size of a city begins glowing red and descending into the atmosphere. Osaka's ears pop from the change in air pressure. That huge thing will hit somewhere not too far east. Osaka struggles to her feet and starts stumbling in the opposite direction.

"Uh…"

The impact is too loud to even register as sound to Osaka's ears. She's thrown into the air by the Earth's violent reverberations.

"Okay," she says aloud, trying to struggle to her feet again. She taps her ears. There's that roaring sound from the anomaly. Now, there's also that annoying ringing sound, too. In addition to the sound of thunder. And the sound of earthquakes. And the sound of trees being torn apart by tornadoes. Are they some special kind of tornado specially designed for ripping up trees? These're really good at it.

A shadow forms. Osaka looks towards the east. A tsunami is growing. It's getting taller and taller. Even though she's nowhere near the coast, she can easily see it approaching.

"Okay…" she says, sweating.

The tsunami hasn't even hit yet when the ground begins shivering, quaking, and then beneath where the school used to be, the ground cracks and then slices open. This slice is more or less perpendicular to the crevice. This slice is orders of magnitude larger than the crevice.

It's an Earth-splitter.

From horizon to horizon, as far as Osaka can see, the ground splits open. It splits wider and wider…

How vast could this possibly be? Osaka slowly crawls to the edge of the slice to see. She peeks over and looks down, gripping the earth firmly. She can't see the bottom.

"Uh… okay…" she whispers.

"_You're supposed to be teaching us English, not math. Math is for _next_ period."_

Then, there's another earthquake. It's similar to the one that happened when the city-sized asteroid struck, except sort of weaker. Maybe it's another asteroid, except one that's hitting further away.

This quake is all that's necessary for Osaka to lose her grip. She tips forward— her heart panics for a moment there— and then she plummets into the depths of the Earth. And she keeps falling. And she keeps falling.

If she looks to her right, she can see the rough crevice as well. The one that the school fell into. But it's quickly narrowing and… it's not there anymore. Yes, this Earth slice is definitely much deeper than that first crevice.

Osaka looks up and sees the sky quickly getting further and further away, until it's basically just a thin blue line. On either side of her are walls of rock and dirt, quickly rushing past her as she continues to fall.

She looks down, and the bottom is still nowhere in sight.

"Okay…" she says.

The walls around are looking hotter and hotter as she falls deeper into the Earth.

"That's lava?" she asks no one in particular. The bright orange gloopy stuff is rushing past her as she continues to fall. But the lava (magma?) doesn't seem to be leaking or exploding into the gap between the walls, though. It's like some sort of supernatural force is keeping the super-hot substance contained. How strange.

It's difficult for Osaka to ponder this situation while in freefall. The unpleasant feeling of falling is very distracting. Her guts keep trying to escape her ribcage. Well, that's what it feels like.

The roar of the whirling anomaly is still loud in Osaka's ears. It's like distance doesn't do anything to the loudness of that anomaly. But at least the sound of the lightning and asteroids and stuff are far away now. It's a tiny bit quieter. A small comfort.

Something sparks above Osaka. She looks up.

"_Aw, come on, leave off her. Why not learn some math in English? S'fun."_

Something flashes past Osaka at an enormous speed— zooming into view from above, roaring past her, and then fading away into the depths below in less than a second. It was cutting another slice. The walls around her reverberate violently.

In a direction perpendicular to the current slice thing, another slice begins cracking open as a direct result of that knife… thing.

"Now there's four." Osaka stares as the new quadrants of Earth begin slowly inching away from each other as well.

She falls in silence for a while.

"What's goin' on!?..." Osaka wails. "What's happenin' to the world? Is this really all because I…?"

She looks around at the walls of molten stuff rushing past her as she continues to fall.

"I can't keep fallin' forever," she says, clenching her fist. "I should oughta do somethin'." She maneuvers herself close to one of the glowing walls. She reaches out with her left hand to try and bring herself to a stop, just like how she saw in a movie once.

_HISSSS…_

Osaka pulls back her left arm and her hand isn't there any more. Just a wrist.

"Aw… Not again…" she says, frowning.

She's still freefalling as fast as ever.

She stares at the blackened tip of her wrist. "Someone once said that eatin' these black burnt things might contribute to cancer…"

She stares at the wrist some more. "Smells like chicken…" she says.

She stares at the wrist as she hurtles past the centre of the inner core of the Earth and starts falling up the other side again.

"Oh… Right… Chiyo-chan said that," Osaka remembers. " 'Don't eat black burnt things.' Chiyo-chan… Darn. Um."

She falls.

Then, the walls around her quake and then a third slice is cut into the Earth, this time at a diagonal to the previous two cuts.

"_Heh. Exactly, Tomo. S'anyway, there's lots of reasons why you can't divide by zero."_

And then the Earth is sliced a fourth time. Then a fifth time.

Osaka is disoriented. "Which way is up?" She looks around. There's still walls of molten— no wait, really dully glowing hot— no wait, lots of rocks and stuff shooting past her.

Something explodes in one direction. She looks that way. There's a faint yellow glow that's already fading away… But wait, that blue line appeared again. Why is it below her now? It's widening…

_Whoosh._

Osaka shoots out of the slice at an enormous speed, hurtling into the air.

"Aiya!?" Osaka's world spins confusingly for a moment (dark blue! light blue! horizons!) before it snaps into focus and she orients herself again. "It changed directions…" she comments breathlessly.

The same supernatural force also seems to be preventing the oceans from spilling into the slice.

"I came out the other side?" Osaka stares downwards at the slice in the ocean that's quickly getting further and further away.

The air shakes.

_WHOOMPH._

An enormous flaming ball of… whaaa? shoots by Osaka and slams into the ocean just a blink later. The flyby blasts Osaka into a dizzying, tumbling spin.

The wide endless dark blue ocean below— no wait, now it's all steam. And is that an shockw—?

_**BOOOM!**_

Another deafening explosion fills Osaka's field of view. Giant fireball. And there are enormous steam clouds now. The shockwave is blasting Osaka upwards, and she hurtles upwards with renewed speed.

"Another asteroid?" Osaka has both of her hands clapped over her ears. So that's what that giant fireball was.

There's that annoying ringing sound in her ears again.

She's slowly spinning in the air. Her field of view is constantly panning from the giant steam cloud below to the horizon, to the sky, to zenith (more or less), to the other horizon, to the steam cloud, to the horizon again…

She has no sense of scale. Just how large is that explosion below?

Oh, the sky's quickly darkening. Altitude. Dark blue. Deep blue. Really dark blue. Indigo? Is that a colour?

And then South America comes into view. Whoa… that's a really large steam cloud. Compared to South America… Well, yeah.

Osaka looks at the world below as she continues to spin in the air. In some places, there are giant storm clouds. And those clouds over there look like a hurricane. A really, really large hurricane. And flames. There're flames everywhere. Well, not everywhere. Not in the water, of course. Water can't burn. Or can it? But still. All the forests are on fire. That entire forest area in South America is bright orange. Yellowish whitish. Flame. That can't be good for the environment.

Oh, and the slices. The Earth is pretty badly chopped up. See, there's one slice, two slices, three, four, five, six, seven…

Even from this height, the slices extend all the way to the horizon. Do they extend all the way around the Earth? Well, yeah, probably.

"_Isn't one divided by zero just infinity?"_

Something flashes out of the corner of her eye. She turns her head and sees more red dots in the distance quickly descending towards Earth. "More asteroids?" she sighs heavily.

Hawaii is coming into view from over the horizon. Those islands. Oh wow, the sea around them is completely red. Did all the volcanoes erupt or something? Whoa, that's a lot of lava. Magma. No, lava. Magma. Lava. Magma. Lava.

Okay, the Earth is falling away faster and faster now. Why is that? She's getting a speed boost.

As she continues to spin around in an erratic pattern, the entire face of the Earth comes into view. A small square surrounds the Earth. 10^7.

The Earth is in terrible condition. Osaka frowns. There are noticeable chunks missing from the Earth. The planet doesn't look very spherical anymore. Must be from the larger asteroids. There are giant plumes of ash and steam coming from the impact sites. Osaka tries to count them. She quickly loses count. "Definitely more than thirty," she says.

The Earth is also horribly cut up. She can see a lot more Earth slices from this height than before. It looks creepy. Each slice is so thin. "Sixty?" Osaka wrinkles her nose. "Seventy? Eighty? Eww…"

Hurricanes, molten lava, windstorms, sandstorms, drought, grasshoppers, wheat rust…

Osaka exerts her willpower and brings her spin to a stop. She stares in horror at the scene below.

There's some motion in her peripheral vision. She flips her body around and sees the moon moving. The moon. Moving. She can actually make out the movement of the moon.

"I don't remember it bein' that fast…" Osaka frowns. She mopes. "Is this another effect? Of my actions?..."

Okay, the moon is definitely getting faster and faster. And faster. "Why's it acceleratin'?" she asks no one in particular.

She holds out her hand at arm's length and spreads her fingers wide. The moon travels across the width of the hand in less than few seconds.

"Oh," she sighs. "That can't be good."

She shifts her hand to the right and spreads it wide again. This time, the moon travels the width of her hand in less than one second.

Sudden realization strikes Osaka. She turns around and stares at the Earth. Then back at the moon. Then at the Earth. Then at the moon again.

"It's…" she puts her hand to her mouth. "It's headin' directly towards the Earth."

No. "No, you can't do that!" Osaka mopes. "So many people have already died! If you crash into the Earth, you'll destroy everything!"

The moon continues on its trajectory towards the Earth.

"No. Bad moon. Bad." No effect. Osaka struggles to try to think of something persuasive enough to get the moon to stop. "Please stop that. I command you. Stop right this instant." Still no effect.

Osaka grimaces. She can't remember anything useful from that lesson about persuasive paragraphs from few years ago. What were the steps again? Persuade… Uh…

"Hold it right there!" The moon is getting even faster. "Go to your room!" Ineffectual.

Osaka gasps and turns her head to follow the distant moon as it blurs across the sky. It covers the remaining distance in the blink of an—

_**RMMMMMMMMMMMMMM-…**_

Blinding light. Osaka holds up her arms to shield her eyes just as the moon violently slams into the Earth. She flinches as the Earth— well, Earth slices—crack apart. Enormous chunks are flying away at enormous speeds and most of the Earth is now just shamjiksneyyyillions of tons of molten lava spraying everywhere—

[Female student # 42 Koyomi: Dead]

[Female teacher # 13 Minamo: Dead]

[Female student # 85 Kagura: Dead]

[Female student # 69 Kaori: Dead]

[Female teacher # 24 Yukari: Dead]

Osaka starts shivering as floods of death notifications start coming in.

"Th… they're all dead," Osaka says despondently.

The remains of the planet Earth and its moon are in the process of blowing up. About a quarter of the molten stuff flies outwards fast enough to completely escape gravity. Even more are in the process of flying away when something blinding white flashes.

Osaka's eyes are a bit teary. She looks up with a gasp as the molten remains of the planet and moon suddenly begin imploding, compressing, contracting…

Then, all of it completely disappears inside of that blinding white anomaly vortex. A spherical shockwave bursts out from the blinding light right after the last bits of her home planet get sucked in.

Osaka flies backwards with ever-increasing speed as the blinding anomaly flares.

She looks around, disoriented, as she gets further and further away.

10^8.

That is an oval. No wait, it's getting sorta pinch-y at the edges and… "It got sucked in too," Osaka moans.

10^9.

10^10.

10^11.

If she looks around, she can see some other lines, too. Orbits? Except they aren't nice and round anymore. "They're getting sucked…" The roaring sound is still loud in Osaka's ears.

That's the sun. Osaka has a glimmer of hope. She remembers that the sun is huge. Really really huge. Surely the sun is massive enough to resist the pull of this vortex. The sun is a million times the size of the Earth! Or was it a hundred? Or… ten thousand? Or one hundred fifty million?

"All that matters is that it's a lot bigger," Osaka says, trying to keep her hopes up.

Then, with a sinking feeling, she realizes that the sun is slowly drifting towards the bright vortex as well, just like all the other planets. In her field of view, the two bright points are slowly drifting closer to each other. When the two bright points finally meet, there's a brief pause, and then Osaka's entire vision goes pure white.

"…" When Osaka's vision clears again in a few seconds, a bunch of other ovals are rapidly shrinking and disappearing into nothingness as she hurtles even faster out of the solar system.

The bright anomaly shimmers.

Stars. The stars in the background are moving.

10^1?.

The stars are accelerating towards the vortex at a tremendous speed. There's a swirling disc of glowing hot star stuff around the vortex now. It's swirling around faster and faster before being absorbed.

"Black… holes…" Osaka remembers hearing about wheelchairs from somewhere. She feels a feeling of dread. "If… If I get sucked in that… I'll… I'll…" Self-consciously, she looks around. "Am I movin' fast enough? To get away in time?"

She's shooting out of the Milky Way. By now, the entire galaxy beginning to perceptibly move and nudge around. It's gradually getting faster, and faster, and then the entire galaxy is swirling around many times a second, making up another one of those accretion disc things around the vortex.

"Uh….." Osaka is speechless. Her eyes are wide open.

"_No, it's not. There's like a bunch of reasons why, but I can't remember. But I'll show you. Look, see what happens if I try to divide by zero in this calculator."_

The swirling disc must be incredibly dense. Too dense. The pressure's too great. It's too much. She feels the beginnings of panic.

_CRACKKKKKKKK._

Osaka flinches as the areas above and below the disk violently crack open. Shards of space fly everywhere. As she thought, it was too much for space to take…

Green numbers begin leaking out of the crack.

Osaka continues hurtling away.

10^23.

All of the other galaxies— they're like pinpoints of light from this distance— begin drifting towards the central vortex crack thing with the speed of eye floaters.

Those are galaxies? That's amazing speed. For galaxies.

No, they aren't like eye floaters anymore. They're… There… Their… They're train lights. The lights of trains in the night traveling at top speed across a bridge.

Another super vision-filling white flash.

Hundreds… Okay, maybe thousands… Maybe millions… Maybe milliards?... Or was it billions? Billiard?... There are so many galaxies are speeding towards the vortex now. Her vision flashes white every now and then as more and more galaxies get absorbed into the vortex. The galaxies are moving at super-speed now. They're starting to look more like long lines than points.

The crack in space cracks wider and wider, spreading out in different directions. An ocean of green numbers is diffusing into space. The broken space.

The roaring of the anomaly is still loud in her ears.

Osaka clutches her head. "Uwehhh…" she moans.

She despairingly looks on the scene of devastation. Okay, this is way too much now. Reality…

Osaka flinches as the universe tremors. The crack is cracking wider and wider in violent bursts.

_0x000000007A (0xC…_

Some numbers are flashing in her peripheral vision when she blinks, but they're fleeting and she doesn't have time to make sense of them.

_BSOD._

A terrible high-pitched whining sound fills Osaka's ears.

_Jd46g1hR6bh4%gdj;6p8_

Osaka is spinning around helplessly, and bright lights keep flaring and flashing. Leprosy? No, stereoscopy? Epilepsy? That thing that someone said happened in a Pokemon episode or something. The flashing lights. That thing. The brain— thing.

"_Uh… Oi, Osaka. You… you all right?"_

The high pitched whining. It just keeps going.

"M… Make it stop!" Osaka cries, clutching her ears.

_Zs#drb89bKk(dWbf4fg_

_ddg^..hsais0jscf_

A deafening scraping buzzing screech fills the air.

!|!|!

_98h(ZHZ)dldY^707-66_

_[sksh]-x8e2146_

The sound is unrelenting. Osaka has stopped spinning and stopped moving. She's frozen in place, and the scene around her is locked up and glitching.

_10^__13497595_.

!|!|!

!|!|!|!

!|!|!|!|!

_10^__93751058209749445923078164_.

!|!|!|!|!|!|!

!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!

!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!

!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!

!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!|!

()

Osaka shoots upright in her bed, panting for breath.

Still panting for breath, she puts her hand to her chest. Her heart is pounding rapidly.

She remains sitting like this for about one minute, looking around, panting for breath. Her body is covered in sweat.

She stays in bed, clutching her covers. Her breathing has calmed somewhat. She looks at the window. It's still dark outside.

* * *

"Isn't one divided by zero just infinity?" Tomo asks, shooting up her hand.

"No, it's not," Yukari-sensei says immediately. She crosses her arms and closes her eyes.

"Why?" Tomo asks.

"Ehhh, I don't remember." Yukari-sensei waves her arm dismissively. "There's like a bunch of reasons why. But here, look." The teacher holds up a standard scientific calculator. "See what happens when I try to divide by zero?" She starts typing in numbers on the calculator.

"No, stop!" Osaka cries, jumping out of her seat.

Yukari-sensei stops, staring at Osaka with a puzzled expression. The '4' and 'divide' have already been inputted into the calculator. Her finger is hovering over the '0' button right now.

Everyone is staring at Osaka with stunned expressions on their faces.

Then, Osaka collapses back onto her seat and then starts shivering. Her eyes go blank.

"Oi, Osaka, you all right?" Yukari-sensei looks very bewildered.

"No, moon…" Osaka whispers, staring vacantly at the board.

"Uh…" Yukari-sensei mutters.

Chiyo hesitantly turns around in her seat "O…Osaka-san, are you all right?"

"You're dead…" Osaka whispers.

"Geh!?" Chiyo shrinks back into her seat in shock. "Um…"

"Oi, Osaka, if you're not going to participate in class because you're not feeling well, you should just go to the nurse's office," Yukari-sensei says.

Kagura raises her hand. "Can we get back to literature now, Yukari-sensei?"

Yukari-sensei's face hardens. "NO."

"I'd really like to do math in math class, and literature in literature class," Kagura says, frowning.

Chiyo talks to Osaka in a low voice. "Would you like me to help you to the nurse's office?"

"I'm your homeroom teacher!" Yukari-sensei says. "I can do whatever I want."

Osaka just stares blankly, not saying anything.

"She has a point though, Yukari-sensei!" Tomo exclaims with a bright smile. "I'm sure the principal would be mad if you supplied us all with misinformation!"

"Hmph," Yukari-sensei crosses her arms. "I may not look it, but I remember some math."

"You just told us a minute ago that you suck at it," Tomo points out enthusiastically.

Chiyo pats Osaka on the shoulder. "I know how you feel," Chiyo says softly. "I recognize that look. But I used some psychological tactics to get past some of the trauma from the Yukari-mobile. I think they can help you a bit in this situation."

"Nothing's stopping me from teaching it, though," Yukari-sensei says.

Chiyo puts Osaka's arm around her shoulder and then slowly helps her out of her seat.

"We can!" Tomo shoots up her hand. "Democracy rules!"

"This isn't a democracy." Yukari smiles smugly. "It's an autocracy!"

Chiyo helps Osaka out the door.

"What about a constitutional monarchy?" someone else pipes in.

"I don't know what that is," Yukari-sensei retorts. "Well, in any case, fine. Let's have a vote. Who thinks I should stop generously teaching you about math now?"

Twenty-seven hands immediately shoot up.

Yukari-sensei counts all of the hands. "…twenty-six, twenty-seven. I see."

She crosses her arms, smiling. "However, I vote no. Since I'm the teacher, I get special privileges. I count for twenty-eight votes. Therefore, I win! So, let's keep learning math."

Groans fill the classroom.

"Now, as I was saying." Yukari holds up the calculator. "If I divide by zero here—"

"NO!" a voice cries from outside of the classroom.

A sweat-drop forms on Yukari-sensei's face. She turns to the doorway. "If I just divide by zero here—"

"NO!"

Yukari-sensei frowns. "You're not even in the classroom, Osaka!"

Silence.

"I'm just going to push a button—"

"NO!"

"…It's just going to—"

"NO!"

"…It's not like—"

"NO!"

"…Nothing will—"

"NO!"

"The numbers—"

"NO!"

"Just listen—"

"NO!"

"The display—"

"NO!"

"But what—"

"NO!"

"How could—"

"NO!"

"Since when—"

"NO!"

"You can't—"

"NO!"

"It won't—"

"NO!"

"If you—"

"NO!"

"Your MOM—"

"NO!"

Yukari-sensei grabs her hair. "AAAAAUGGGGH! Fine!"

There's dead silence again.

* * *

**あずまんが大王****- Azumanga Daioh: created by Azuma Kiyohiko**


End file.
